The Department of Labor's Dislocated Worker Initiative holds the principle of "prevention of layoffs whenever possible." Authored by the SVA, a new Layoff Aversion Guidebook, a national compendium of job retention and layoff aversion strategies for states and communities, was developed, in cooperation with the department's National Rapid Response Workgroup. This summary has been distributed broadly for input. This Guidebook provides:

A practitioner's guide to job retention and job-oriented economic development strategies for states and communities;

A policy review of the Workforce Investment Act's rapid response program, which provides state support for layoff aversion;

Examples of connections between economic development and workforce development communities;

An overview of cutting-edge programs and policies in aversion and retention practices, and an analysis of the best strategies, tactics and models in the field.

As the Guidebook points out, there are numerous successful strategies, networks and tools that have been very successful in averting plant closures and business failures, and retaining jobs. However, there is very little information about these strategies, and there are no networks or learning tools that analyze and articulate the lessons learned from the basic retention/workforce-connected models currently active in the field. This study seeks to full that gap.